


The Tenth Man

by sal_si_puedes



Category: Suits (TV)
Genre: (mentioned) - Freeform, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Comment Fic, M/M, Minor Character Death, but there is a bright silver lining, sad!fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-10
Updated: 2016-12-10
Packaged: 2018-09-07 16:11:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8807479
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sal_si_puedes/pseuds/sal_si_puedes
Summary: His bags are packed and his condo is immaculately clean. It’s so clean it echoes, and Harvey can still hear Marcus’s voice through the telephone last night, giving him the news.Comment fic written as a reaction to this promo pic for s06ep11 ("She's Gone").





	

It’s Wednesday night, a little before midnight, and just two more days until the wedding. Mike walks into the living room coming from the kitchen, two glasses of wine in his hands, and he stops when he’s just one step through the kitchen door. 

Rachel has curled up on the sofa, her eyes closed, and she’s breathing evenly. She’s asleep, the seating plan and brochures about flower arrangement strewn all over the coffee table and the floor. She sighs and smacks her lips.

Mike can’t have been in the kitchen for more than ten minutes, clearing away the leftovers from their take-out dinner and fixing them another drink. She’s been up most of the last seven nights, dividing her attention between law school, her current case at the firm and various last minute wedding arrangements, and Mike knows she is exhausted. 

Something twists inside of him, his stomach probably or maybe his heart, and he briefly bites his lips. She looks beautiful as she lies there on the sofa but the sinking feeling that has been Mike’s constant companion ever since he left her at the altar the first time all those months ago won’t go away now either. Something is not right, something doesn’t fit, but Mike can’t put his finger on what exactly that is. 

There’s a knock on the door and Rachel stirs a little but she doesn’t wake up. Mike sets the glasses down on the coffee table as quietly as he can and then he hurries to answer the door.

It’s Harvey who is standing outside and he looks like shit, he’s pale and his skin looks sallow somehow and his lips are cracked and dry. Mike inhales sharply at the sight and Harvey holds Mike’s gaze for some moments before he looks aside. 

“I need to talk to you. Do you have a minute?”

“Rachel’s asleep,” Mike murmurs, trying to talk as quietly as possible. “She just fell asleep and I—“

“Mike.”

Harvey exhales loudly and Mike worries his lower lips between his teeth.

“Are you going to let me in or not?”

“Okay,” Mike says, opening the door so Harvey can step inside. “But be quiet.”

He leads Harvey through the living room, casting a fleeting look at Rachel as they pass the sofa, and into the kitchen. He closes the door behind them and turns around.

“What’s wrong?”

“Mike, sit down.”

Mike does as Harvey tells him to, but once he’s up on one of the stools he slides down again so he’s just leaning against it.

“What’s the matter, Harvey?”

Harvey takes a deep breath and shakes his head briefly, his hands balling into tight fists. The next breath is obviously meant to dissolve the tension in his body but as far as Mike can tell it isn’t working.

“I’m not going to make it to the wedding.”

Mike blinks and his brows furrow. He suddenly notices how cold his hands are and how rapidly his heart is beating in his chest.

“What?”

“There’s a thing I need to tend to.”

Harvey avoids his eyes and the whole thing, him and Harvey in that kitchen, feels like falling. Mike has to grab hold of the table’s edge to keep himself steady.

“You’re kidding,” he whispers, searching for Harvey’s eyes but without success. Harvey keeps staring at the floor next to Mike’s feet, pursing his lips and shaking his head.

“No,” he says after a long pause, still not looking up. “I’m sorry.”

“A thing.” Mike smoothes his shaking hand over his chest, trying to get the palm dry and his heartbeat to calm down, his voice trembling at least as much as his muscles.

“Yeah,” Harvey finally looks up and their eyes meet. “A family thing.”

Realization hits Mike like a bolt of lightning. Harvey’s eyes widen for a moment and then they narrow again, Harvey’s gaze never wavering. Mike can’t describe what it is he sees in those eyes but it claws at him so deep inside he thinks he’s going to be sick. Swallowing against the nausea, Mike nods. Just once.

“God, Harvey, I am so sorry.”

Harvey’s jaws clench so very tightly as he mirrors Mike’s gesture and he swallows, too.

“Thank you.”

Harvey takes a deep, shuddering breath and squares his shoulders, nodding again. He turns around to leave but then he stops half-way. 

“I’m sorry, Mike,” he says, his voice raw and husky. “I…”

Mike’s hand reaches out for Harvey but when Harvey turns back towards the door it falls to his side again. 

“Don’t worry,” Mike murmurs and he suspects that his words sound as pained as Harvey’s. “I’ll… We’ll be all right. I’ll come up with something and… You do what you need to do.”

All Mike can do is watch Harvey leave and when the door to their apartment falls shut behind him Rachel stirs on the sofa, yawning, before she slowly sits up. She looks around until she finds Mike still rooted to the spot in the kitchen.

“Mike? Who was that?”

*****

His bags are packed and his condo is immaculately clean. It’s so clean it echoes, and Harvey can still hear Marcus’s voice through the telephone last night, giving him the news, and he can still hear the ancient blessing, harrowing words in Hebrew, falling from his unpracticed lips as if they had come to them from nowhere.

An aneurism, apparently, and they were on the clock. The funeral had already been set for Friday. They were short one man, so would Harvey come and be the tenth?

His first thought had been of Mike, of course, and of the wedding and his throat had choked up as he had nodded.

_Harvey?_

Marcus’s voice, piercing his ear again because, of course, he hadn’t been able to see Harvey’s reaction.

 _Yeah_ , he had said, swallowing around the tightness in his throat. _Yeah, I’ll be there._ He had ended the call before Marcus had been able to say anything else.

Then he had left for Mike’s.

A sharp knock on his door shakes Harvey from his thoughts. He can feel the whole sleepless night in his bones, no, in his whole body, really, on the inside of his eyelids and on the tip of his tongue, as he walks down the hallway to see who is there.

Donna. 

He opens the door and lets her walk through, his eyes following her along the hallway and up to where his bags are waiting on the floor, all neatly packed, in the middle of the dining room.

“What are you doing?”

The sound of his steps rings in his ears and his breathing is far too loud inside of his head. Walking up to her, he raises his chin.

“What does it look like?”

“Mike told me,” she says and for the first time Harvey realizes that the dress she’s wearing is black. “I’m coming with you.”

Mike. His suit isn’t black, it’s gray, a dark shade of gray, charcoal, actually, and a sharp wave of relief washes through Harvey at the thought that Mike had taken it home with him the other day and had not left it at Harvey’s as they had originally planned. The stag night. He has to do something about the stag night.

“No,” he says, shaking his head slowly. “No, you’re not.”

“Harvey,” Donna replies and takes a small step towards him. “I am so, so sorry.” 

Harvey’s eyes follow her hand as it reaches for his upper arm and touches him there. It’s a hard, unrelenting touch and Harvey has to gather all his strength not to recoil from it or shake that hand off.

He nods. “Thank you.”

When she tries to close the distance between them completely, Harvey stiffens and she stops.

“I’m not going to let you go alone.”

“Yes,” he says, taking a step backwards and rubbing his palms over his upper thighs. “Yes, you are.”

“You shouldn’t be alone,” she murmurs, and the warm, yet shaking tone in her voice makes Harvey’s chest tighten. He can’t breathe.

“Donna,” he says, turning around so he’s facing the kitchen island. He leans forward and rests his hands on the cool, clean surface. “I appreciate your concern, but you are not coming with me.” His head drops a little between his shoulders and he clenches his jaws and breathes through his nose. It’s too sticky in the room and maybe his shirt is a bit too small, too, he doesn’t know.

“Yes, Harvey, I am. You need—“

“Donna,” he snaps and swirls around, narrowing his eyes and clenching his fists. “I said no.”

“Why not?” Once more, she takes one step closer but he stops her by holding up his hand. “I could—“

“Because,” Harvey says and he knows he’s almost yelling. “Because I don’t want you there. I don’t want you to come with me and I don’t want you there. This is private and I don’t want you to be there with me.”

He’s panting but he catches on to that only when Donna shakes her head and her shoulders drop. 

She stares at him for a couple more moments before she shakes her head again and walks past him into the hallway.

“Donna,” he says when she’s a little over half-way to the door. He clears his throat and she turns around. “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah,” she croaks, nodding slowly. “I know.”

The door falls shut behind her with a hollow thud.

******

Marcus is standing next to him and it’s clammy and cold outside and it feels as if it is going to start raining any minute. The coffin is very small and the rabbi’s voice is too feeble to penetrate the buzzing in Harvey’s ears. A word here and there, but nothing more.

It’s a little after two p.m. and Harvey keeps his eyes strictly to the front, his back straight and his hands loosely clasping each other. There’s a black piece of cloth pinned to the left lapel of his coat and he still can see and feel Marcus’s fingers fumbling with the tiny safety pin until he had managed to fasten it there. Harvey hadn’t had the heart or had it been the energy to tell him to stop and just leave him be.

So now it’s fluttering there in the tired, cold, numbing breeze, a flickering shadow at the periphery of his vision, and it’s more distracting than he had thought it would be.

He breathes steadily, an almost superhuman effort, and wills his fingers not to clench. Marcus is fidgeting next to him but Harvey tries to block it out. He keeps his eyes straight to the front, fixed to the bark of some old, gnarly tree on the other side of the coffin, at the end of the graveyard.

Gradually, the moist, cold wind dampening his right cheek dies down and the chill is replaced by a feeling of warmth. A shape hovers there, right next to him to his right, something dark and warm and solid, and Harvey closes his eyes for a moment.

He takes a deep, greedy breath. He’d recognize that smell anywhere, anywhere in the world.

It takes him some time to turn his head and when he finally does and the warm shape comes into focus, Mike turns his head as well and his eyes find Harvey’s.

Mike nods, just once, but it feels as if the weight of a mountain is being lifted from Harvey’s shoulders and the next breath he takes finally, finally gives him some air.

Harvey nods back in return and swallows and Mike’s eyes just stay like that, offering themselves to his, for as long as his eyes need to hold on to them, and when Harvey breaks their contact and allows his eyes to travel over the coffin’s lid for the first time, Mike moves a little closer and the feeling of warmth intensifies.

When it’s time to say the words, Harvey inhales shakily and joins in, praising a god he has never known and whom Lily hadn’t been very familiar with either. It still feels good to stand there and say those words, though, along with the others and with Mike by his side, a silent presence, it feels right.

And when afterwards, after the prayer and after Harvey’s clumsy fingers have ripped a tear into the flapping black cloth over his heart, Mike takes Harvey’s hand in his, Harvey doesn’t flinch. He lets Mike take his cold hand in his warm one and he returns the gentle squeeze of Mike’s fingers without hesitation.

*****

When it’s all over, Harvey turns to his right to face Mike, his hand still in Mike’s. “Weren’t you supposed to get married today?”

Harvey knows that his words carry feebly over the humming murmur of voices around them but he can see in Mike’s eyes that he has heard them.

“Yeah. Yeah, I was.”

Harvey lowers his gaze and turns Mike’s hand around in his. Mike’s fingers are bare and that sight makes Harvey bite his lips.

“But you didn’t.”

“No.”

“No.” Harvey lifts his gaze again and his eyes find Mike’s. “Why?”

“Because I finally realized what had been wrong all this time. Because I realized that there was just one place I wanted to be today, and just one thing that I wanted to do. And that wasn’t getting married to Rachel in that church.”

Slowly, Harvey lets Mike’s hand slip from his grip and he starts to raise his hand, his fingers itching to touch Mike’s cheek or his lips, they don’t really care and Harvey can’t tell a difference between the two anyway. But before his fingers can reach their goal, Harvey stops and lets his hand sink again.

Mike nods.

“I’ll go now, then. See you back in New York.”

He turns to leave but Harvey catches his sleeve before he can walk away.

“Wait.”

Mike stops and turns around.

“Please stay.”

A small smile begins to form on Mike’s lips and he nods.

“There is someone I want you to meet.”

Mike nods again and Harvey turns to the man standing to his left and who is shaking hands and accepting condolences.

“Marcus?”

His brother turns around, tilting his head in a way that strangely reminds Harvey of himself. “Here’s someone I want you to meet.” He guides Mike to stand next to him with a hand on the small of his back. He exchanges a quick look with Mike and nods.

“Marcus, this is Mike.”

 

~fin~

**Author's Note:**

> I'm [sal-si-puedes](http://sal-si-puedes.tumblr.com/) on tumblr, come and say "Hi!".


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